1 Ekim 2013 Salı

Neuromarketing: Can Science Predict What We'll Buy?

Having the best technology or the highest quality solution does not guarantee that prospects will always buy from you. But exciting new findings in brain research suggest that speaking to the true decision maker, the old brain, will raise your effectiveness in communicating an idea or selling a product.
Researchers have demonstrated that human beings make decisions in an emotional manner and then justify them rationally. Furthermore, we know that the final decision is actually triggered by the old brain, a brain that does not even understand words.

Advertisers have long used science to peer into consumers’ brains; today ‘neuromarketing’ has given them the power to delve into our subconscious.

Based on the Neuromarketing concept of decision processing, consumer buying decisions rely on either

System 1 or System 2.
- Autopilot (System 1): acts quickly and effortlessly using intuition, fast and emotional.
- Pilot (System 2): thinking that is slow and requires effort, deliberate and conscious reasoning.

The autopilot processes every single bit of information from all our five senses and has huge processing power. In contrast, the poor old pilot has a processing capacity 0.0004% the size of the autopilot.
In the same way most of a long-haul flight is flown on auto-pilot, we fly through most of our daily lives the same way. Only when absolutely neeeded do we engage the pilot.

While autopilot is processing 11 million information in a minute, live pilot could only process 44 information which means human brain works automatically at a ratio of 9 to 10. Therefore, it may be assumed that nearly all of our decisions are made unconsciously. In the same way most of a long-haul flight is flown on auto-pilot, we fly through most of our daily lives the same way. Only when absolutely needed do we engage the pilot. This is how we can choose 30 items from the 30,000 in a supermarket in only 30 minutes.

The autopilot allows us to act without really thinking. And it does this using shortcuts. For example pricing is one of the most powerful signifiers of brand positioning. For example, when given two glasses of wine, both with the same wine but one at $80 and one at $10, people thought the more expensive wine tasted much better. Or, product formats speak louder than words to communicate a positioning. For example, Unilever used of granules not powder for instant soup to suggest higher quality, as this format reminded people of the granules in premium coffees like Nescafe Gold Blend.
In brief, consumers are not rational actors as predicted by classic economic and marketing theory, but they are intuitive actors who deploy both conscious and nonconscious impressions, evaluations, and choices to help them navigate the marketplace and make good decisions in an extremely complex and noisy commercial world.

Now lets look how brands use neuromarketing:

1.eBay:
Through its online payment company Paypal, used neuromarketing and found out that promoting speed in use of their service is more emotionally appealing for the consumer than promoting information security, as it did before.

2.Unilever:
ice cream applied neuromarketing and found that the ice causes greater pleasure than chocolate or yogurt.

3.Coca-Cola:
Has their own in-house neuroscience lab, where they use neuroimaging techniques in real time while volunteer subjects watch various commercials, using the scientific method and completely unbiased neural responses to what the subjects are hearing and seeing. Ultimately, the scans spit out an arbitrary score, allowing the brand to choose which commercials, or even individual shots, are most effective in promoting their product.

4.Frito Lay:
Tested their advertisements, products and packaging using neuromarketing. One study focused on the reactions of the women’s brains in order to find a way to be more attractive to that market. The results showed a rejection to campaigns using guilt, and women accepted the ones that were associated with health. They also found out that natural or matte colors and images of healthy ingredients on their packaging did not motivate purchase. They discovered that matte beige bags of potato chips picturing potatoes and other “healthy” ingredients in the snack don’t trigger activity in the anterior cingulate cortex – an area of the brain associated with feelings of guilt – as much as shiny bags with pictures of chips.

5.Mercedes-Benz Daimler:
Used neuromarketing for a campaign in which the fronts of cars were simulating human faces, linking directly to the pleasure center of the brain. Sales rised with 12% in the first quarter.

6.Campbell‘s:
Redesigned their soup labels. They included a more contemporary soup, spoon disappeared and vapors were added, the key elements as the user perceives what he is looking for: a hot soup with flavor and aroma. They reduced the size of their logo, typography changed its type, size and color to be more pleasing to the eye and more clear to the consumer mind.

7. Microsoft:
used neuromarketing to gauge the effectiveness of some of its campaigns on the Xbox platform (how engaged gamers are when they use an Xbox). They wanted to get a clearer picture of how stimulated the brain was during 30 and 60-second TV ads compared with in-game ads run on the Xbox. While viewing TV ads for an automotive brand, the most brain activity happened in the first half of the ad. However, when watching the Xbox Live via in-game advertising, brain activity peaked at the repeat image of the car, reinforcing the advertisement’s memorability, claims Microsoft. Ads that excite several parts of the brain are supposed to make viewers more likely to go out and buy the product advertised.